


Fade to Black, Show The Names, Play the Sad Song

by kjstark



Series: JATP ficlet requests [2]
Category: Julie and The Phantoms (TV)
Genre: M/M, Multi, One-Sided Attraction, Pre-Canon, Reggie Angst (Julie and The Phantoms), Sad Ending, Unrequited Crush, Unrequited Love
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-20
Updated: 2020-11-20
Packaged: 2021-03-09 22:00:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,619
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27643106
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kjstark/pseuds/kjstark
Summary: All his life, Reggie's had to watch the people he loves fall in love with everyone but him.
Relationships: Alex/Luke Patterson (Julie and The Phantoms), Alex/Reggie (Julie and The Phantoms), Luke Patterson/Reggie (Julie and The Phantoms)
Series: JATP ficlet requests [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1982629
Comments: 24
Kudos: 160





	Fade to Black, Show The Names, Play the Sad Song

**Author's Note:**

> This is not a happy story, I am sorry in advance. 
> 
> I had to get this idea off my chest after I made this [gifset](https://buckybear.co.vu/post/634338362449330176/in-the-end-wed-be-laughing-watching-the-sunset) on Tumblr.

Reggie likes to think of himself as a testament to human endurance. But not from a misguided high ground, no. More from a "look how much of an idiot a person can be" point. 

Which is something else he'd wanna talk about: everyone thinks he's always been an idiot, but he's not. 

What he's been is just a hopeless in love with people who seem to be interested in everyone else _but_ him. 

First it was Rosemary and that cherry hair. God, those freckles. Reggie had been promptly swept off. 

She thought his jokes were funny but then she found Rickie's jokes funnier and Reggie had to sit and watch her give him a Valentine's card. 

And Rickie was missing two front teeth, for christ sake. 

Reggie didn't have time to dwell on his first heartache, 'cause his dad got a new job and they moved to California just as he picked up a new hobby in the middle of his stage of teenage misery blues: playing bass. 

The low tunes helped his mind ease, and also quiet down the screaming matches his parents seemed to be into nowadays. 

At least he liked the Californian sun. Plus, it helped that he got to see girls in bikinis on a daily basis now. And all he had to do was just stare out the window. 

It's how he caught sight of Luke first. 

Short, hair all over his face, and a six-strings almost permanently attached to his chest. He went almost every afternoon to play by the beach. Reggie thought he sounded great. 

It was weird, the way he felt drawn. And Reggie being so hyperactively social his whole life found it even weirder when he actually felt nervous the first time Luke noticed him watching. 

It wasn't until the third week they coincided there that Reggie blurted: "I play bass!" 

Out of fucking nowhere.

Way to go, Reginald. 

Luke blinked and chuckled, then walked over to him. "Oh, cool. I'm Luke," he said, just completely friendly. A straight-up cool guy. 

"Reggie," he shook back. 

It was a good way to end the summer. 

New school year started and he sought out his chance to start from scratch. Cut his hair shorter on the sides, started wearing gel. And shoes— black shoes, no more sneakers. 

"This is the guy," Luke introduced him to his friends, his so-called bandmates, as Reggie made his way through the parking lot of school. 

'Alex' and 'Bobby', if Reggie remembered correctly. They looked like two entirely different states of being. 

Alex was wearing a lilac tee and Bobby was dressed in all shades of black and blacker. Luke was not even a middle point between them, either. He was wearing a bright yellow beanie and a sleeveless white shirt. 

Reggie, with his dark shoes and black leather, must've made them look like an odd, distant cousins gathering for the holidays. 

He almost felt like he liked them already. 

Except Alex shook his hand and went "You are aware we're over 60 degrees here, right?" 

If Reggie had to burn under his jacket, he would. He's committed to his outfit like that. 

"I'm cold-blooded," he replied, easily. 

Alex nodded, then, and Bobby said nothing else after his own name. 

So, clinging to Luke's side was it, then. 

It took him a few more weeks to feel like himself again. He hadn't really expected that a new town would take such a toll on him but Ronnie went off to college and now he had to play older brother to Dickie. 

It didn't help that his dad had been sleeping on the couch for a week now and Reggie couldn't watch the crappy, forbidden adult films they showed on cable TV when it was past midnight. 

"Are you okay, man?" Luke asked a week later, Reggie had stayed up all night listening to his parents yell about money and love affairs and everything else that a child shouldn't even know about. 

They were sitting by the bleachers, they had a free period and Alex was stuck in chem while Bobby had math. 

Reggie eyed him and took a deep breath before he even realized he was planning on telling Luke about his shitty family life. 

Which Reggie hadn't really thought was shitty until he started talking out loud. 

Opening your heart up has a funny effect on people.

At least on empathetic people like Luke, Reggie mused when Luke brought him a bag of homemade cookies the next day to school. 

"I had my mom make 'em for you," he shared in the cafeteria. Alex quirked an eyebrow and Bobby chewed silently on his tuna sandwich. 

"Thanks, man," Reggie said, happily taking the goods. 

Alex's face turned into a frown. "Is it your birthday?" He asked, confused. 

Reggie shook his head. "Not yet. In a few weeks," he said. 

Luke raised his eyebrows. "Hold on, really?" 

Reggie nodded with his mouth full of cookies. "Yuh. Ohm th hixteemth," he made out. 

All three boys frowned at him. 

"Swallow first and then you talk," Alex instructed in that tone of his. 

Reggie still did, though. 

"On the sixteenth," he said. 

They all nodded. 

"Oh, great, then," Luke replied, smiling widely and Reggie didn't miss Alex eyeing him weird. 

But he didn't think much of it. 

Bobby was quiet and an old soul, Reggie thought they didn't have much in common, but Bobby didn't unsettle him. Not like Alex did. 

Alex would snicker at most of Reggie's comments but he saved him a seat in history. He would share his Walkman at lunch but he would glare at him when Reggie missed his tempo. 

It made Reggie think of Ronnie a little, if only slightly less familial. But he doubted Alex thought of his sister Annie when he dealt with him. 

Nah, Alex hated him. He just pretended he didn't for Luke and Bobby's sake. 

Reggie went looking for Alex outside of the garage as soon as Luke said they had to take a breather. Alex was resting his head on his forearms, hugging his legs. 

"You know, one of us is gonna have to tell Luke this band won't work because the drummer can't stand the bassist," Reggie chimed in, in good humor, but his voice was down. 

Alex didn't raise his head to look. "That's not true," he said from under his arms. 

Reggie looked to the side. "Well, I believe you will find it's hard to make music if the rhythmic section hates each other…" 

"I don't hate you," Alex said, sternly, raising his head to shoot a glare at him. His blue eyes looked at the brink of tears. 

"Yeah, that death stare definitely tells me you don't hate me," Reggie bit back. 

Alex sighed and rolled his eyes. "That's just because you're being stupid, as _usual_. I do not hate you, Reggie. If I hated you, trust me, you would _know_ ," he explained, his eyes wide. 

It was true. Alex couldn't stand a lot of people in their class, and he was pretty upfront about it. No two-faced bullshit with him. 

Reggie let out a breath and his arms fell to his sides. "Then why do I feel like you're one second away from throwing something at my head almost every time?" 

Alex tilted his head. "'Cause I _am_ one second away from throwing something at your head... most times," he said, but then he smiled at Reggie like it was all a joke to him. 

Still, there was a deepness to Alex's greenish blue eyes that Reggie felt compelled enough to sit next to him and ask:

"Something's still up with you, isn't it?" 

Alex lowered his head once more before he nodded, looking at his lap. 

Reggie turned to sit facing him. "You don't have to tell me. But I'm here, if you ever wanna talk. I'm a great listener and secrets keeper," he said with a big smile.

Alex eyed him and smiled faintly. "Yeah, I don't think this I can talk about…" 

"Why? Did you kill somebody?" Reggie said, widening his eyes, funnily. Alex chuckled and Reggie brushed his shoulder against his. "Cause if that's the case, I can help you hide the body," he offered softly, smile on his face. 

Alex eyed him for a second and his eyes watered up. 

Reggie shifted in his position and felt his throat close. He was really bothered by whatever was troubling him. "Alex…" Reggie pressed a hand on his shoulder and Alex fell into his chest, sobbing. 

"I'm gay," he mumbled at Reggie's necklace, shaky yet firm. 

Reggie didn't move his arms from around him for a second, before he took a breath and gripped harder, hugging him in response. 

He didn't say 'it's okay' or 'I'm happy for you' because the first Alex probably knew that already and the second one, well, the fuck does it matter what Reggie feels? 

Alex must've had his reasons to feel conflicted about this, Reggie couldn't even hope to understand what that was like. 

Not that Reggie's ever thought about his sexuality, or sexuality at all, beyond thinking 'damn, girls are really hot'. 

He had had it simple. 

Or at least that's what he thought until his birthday came around a few weeks later after Alex's mind-blowing confession. 

That, by the way, did great things for them in their blossoming friendship. Again, opening your heart is a great foundation for trust and bonding. 

And now he didn't have to cling to Luke anymore, because he could be with Alex. And Alex was unfiltered and completely himself when they were alone, studying or working on a beat. 

"No, listen, I would totally fuck Tom Cruise. There's nothing gay about that," Reggie jokes, they're looking at Alex's sister magazines. 

Alex shot a laugh. "There's nothing gay to you openly admitting you would sleep with a man?" 

Reggie blinked like it dawned on him, but Alex's laughter eased him. 

It was all jokes and games. 

Until he went to bed and dreamt of silky blond hair and long fingers up and down his back. 

He received his fifteenth birthday with the mind-boggling question of _what the fuck was that dream._

And now he couldn't look at Alex for all the first period. 

"So," Luke did a little drum roll with his hands on the table. "What are we doing for your birthday? Your folks throwing you a party or what?" he asked. 

His father had left early in the morning before Reggie woke up and all his mom did was hand him his bag with a 'happy birthday, sweetheart'. 

"Nope. Just us, I guess," Reggie shrugged. 

"Oh, we can go to the Santa Monica pier," Alex offered, smiling at him. 

God, had Alex's eyes always been this blue? 

Reggie swallowed. "Sure," he muttered. 

"Can't wait to see you throw up after we come down from the Plunge," Bobby joked, ruffling his hair. 

At least he had his friends, he thought. 

"Wanna go up?" Alex came behind him when Reggie stood watching the ferris wheel, absentmindedly. 

Reggie turned his shoulder and shrugged.

"You've been acting weird today," Alex accused him. 

"Aren't I always weird to you?" Reggie countered, trying to be funny. 

Alex made a face that he agreed. But then he swung his arm around him. "You know you can tell me anything, too, right?" he said, lowering his face to whisper. 

Luke and Bobby were playing with the water guns behind them, entirely unaware of how hard Reggie's heart was beating. 

Alex was beautiful up close. His face clean, skin clear, a few faint freckles speckled across his cheeks and those eyes. God. Reggie's never seen that shade of blue. 

Then there's his pretty pink lips and Reggie thought about it. It was brief and fleeting but he did. 

He wanted to kiss him. 

"We're up," Alex declared, moving quick on his feet and Reggie's left there, startled. 

Because he knows that's one thing to recognize a male celebrity's attractiveness and another thing entirely to _actually_ wanna kiss one of your male friends. 

Crap. He was _finito._

He kicks himself a little. Saves several thoughts for later and goes up on the wheel with Alex. 

He gets to stare at him up high, surrounded by the twinkling lights beneath them and the moonlight above. 

It serves as a great introspector, honestly. Being this high up and alone, with his thoughts and Alex looking down at the beach and the pier. 

Most people who know him would say he's not much of a thinker, and it's only half-true. He doesn't think things before he says or does them, but he does think a lot. 

It's that his mind is a rushing mess of thoughts and ideas and, mostly, emotions that he gets easily overwhelmed with. It's monkeys on drugs up in here. 

But he's carefully studying what he's feeling right then. 

And by the time the wheel moves them down again, Reggie's concluded: 

It's 'girls are hot but if Alex ever wanted to kiss me, it's on…' 

That's what it boiled down to, then. 

Reggie doesn't even think it's a crush (even though he sits closer to Alex now, close enough to touch, and the highlight of every one of their gigs is turning back just a little and catching Alex give him a wink before they keep playing, at their own little beat) until it washes over him like the waves he hears when he falls asleep every night: 

Luke brushed his hand with Alex's under the desk in their shared biology class and Alex tried to hide the embarrassing blushing. 

So, that was the second. 

And unlike stupid Rickie and his missing teeth, Luke was an absolute catch. 

And yes, Reggie was man enough to say that. 

It was God awful, watching them. Not only because Reggie's head was clouded with oddly specific fantasies of chaste kisses and impossible white picket fences and there even was that time Alex was flying with Reggie in his arms like Superman. 

That had been too much sugar, perhaps. 

Whatever, it was awful because he had to be happy for them. Because they were happy and having fun and not holding things in like he was. 

But, hell, he was even jealous that Luke didn't seem to be not even slightly fazed by the fact that he was into another dude at all. 

Luke had kissed more girls than all four of them combined. (Though Alex doesn't really count)

"I don't care for labels, I like people. Period," Luke explained when Reggie asked, curious. Luke was licking jelly off his fingers and Reggie tried not to follow the movement with his eyes but he failed miserably. 

Then he knew he had a storm coming. 

He was distracted from his usual teenage heartache, as expected with such a busy, running brain as his, by the complexity of his label. 

He liked girls, that was a given. But then he also liked Alex and his stupid fannypack and demeaning jokes about him.

He banged his head against the table and cursed under his breath. Whatever, it wasn't like Alex had any attention to spare him; his thing with Luke up and sailing. 

* * *

They broke up just fresh before summer started and Reggie felt himself breathing again. It wasn't only that he was crushing after Alex but also that they had become a bit unbearable about it, too. 

But, well, first relationships and all that. 

Not that Reggie knew shit about that because he tried to ask Sonya, Ashley and Diana to different school dances and was turned down with care. 

Sonya and Ashley were actually into Luke and Bobby and not him and then Diana had some girl friend she wanted to go stag with. 

"She's definitely gay," Alex explained to him, amused. 

Reggie frowned, bitter. "Well, you're not a hundred percent sure. People can like both," he refuted. 

Alex opened his palms at him, as if to calm him. 

Reggie realized what he just said, then. 

_Hmm_.

Struggling with object permanence was a side-effect to ADHD, as far as Reggie understood. His mind kept busy, moved on, and if stuff stopped being in front of his big dummy eyes, then it might as well just not exist. 

Which was, funny enough, exactly how he got over Alex over the summer. 

He left for a stupid Church camp and Reggie thought his chances to court him this summer, to have his shot now, had flown out the window. 

"Don't look so bummed. We'll have fun without them," Luke tried to play it cool. 

Reggie had a bad mood for exactly ten hours. By morning, tanning on a sunny day at the beach with Luke, all his concerns lost themselves in a tight fuchsia bikini. 

Yeah, no, he _definitely_ liked girls.

But then Luke started working out and the metaphorical roof Reggie had built over his head came falling. Just freaking _crashing_ down on him like a rain of invisible yet very painful concrete. 

If Alex was beautiful, Luke was fucking hot and Reggie felt almost dizzy if he stared for too long. 

The swimming shorts clinged wet to him and Reggie could trail the lines visibly, nothing left to imagination. He felt his throat dry and he looked up and away once Luke finished making his way toward him. 

"Water's great, dude. Are you coming in?" He asked. 

"I thought it was coming out," Reggie replied. 

"What?" Luke asked, confused.

"What?" Reggie replied in the same confusion. 

Luke frowned and pressed his lips in a line before he said: "I meant _into the water_?"

Oh. 

"Oh, yeah, yeah. Sure. Absolutely," he said, chugging off his shirt and running head first into the sea. 

Cold water, yes. That's what he needed. 

But cold water does shit for him when Luke notices Reggie's fallen in a bad mood because of his parents again and does everything in him to keep him distracted. 

Cold water ain't gonna help the way his heart beats when he watches Luke fall asleep inches from him, warmth radiating so big Reggie imagines what it must be like to sleep under the coat of those big muscle-y arms. 

So what does it boil down to now? 

  * Girls? No question about it. 
  * Alex, if he ever asked.
  * Luke, but only for, like, sleeping purposes.



Reggie thought he was losing it, whatever fight he was fighting. It was ridiculous. 

He just got over his very pressing interest in Alex and now he was gonna replace that with an acute curiosity of what it would be like to be held in Luke's arms? _Crushed_ , too, why not? 

Hell, he wanted to be ruined. No two ways about it. 

He was a masochist, that was it. 

A masochist and an idiot. 

Alex came back before Reggie could gather the messy void he calls a brain and here's a funny thing about friendly exes: 

They always end up falling back to old habits. 

So, when Reggie catches Alex pulling Luke to his face behind the garage after one rehearsal, Reggie feels himself sink again. 

Technically, it was the second time repeated. But Reggie indulged himself and counted this one, too. 

That was the third.

And this time it was Luke who had his focus. Luke who welcomed him and gave him cookies. Luke who poked his tongue out when Reggie sang inches away from his face. 

Luke who was unapologetic and unconcerned and who liked girls and guys alike and was not crippled by that knowledge. 

Reggie thought Luke made him feel like a toss up between wanting to be _with_ him and _be_ him. 

They fell off eventually again, just when Reggie's closing in on giving up chasing after lost causes, and his hopes are all brought back again. 

His neck hurt from his constant turning between looking at Alex and Luke. 

He learned the term 'bisexual' entirely by accident, in one of those book club gigs they did, and there was some kind of church chorus in the background of his head. 

Fucking finally. 

* * *

He didn't have time to enjoy the thrilling excitement of having a name for what he felt, for who he was, though. 

"Chill, man, street dogs haven't killed us yet," he said. 

Those were his final words. 

And really, Reggie wanted to hold it against Alex sometimes but he had to give it to him: he _was_ an idiot. 

However, dying-but-not-really gave him a little perspective. And he figured that now that he was just a floating spirit, what's the worst that could happen if you tell your bandmates you've had a raging crush on both of them for longer than you can even remember? 

Right. The fourth time. Which technically was the fourth _and_ fifth, but who even cared anymore. 

"I met a new ghost friend," Alex told him, specifically.

Luke got spared, alright. He was the ex. But what the hell was Reggie? The confidante.

Still, he got distracted enough to not hurt. "'Woke', cool word." 

And it was. This new future was very cool.

"She's just— amazing," Luke breathed, absolutely lost in the sheet he found in Julie's little box. 

Reggie saw the glint in Luke's eyes and he knew: he'd lost again. 

But loving someone means loving their happiness, too. And that's what he figured he'd have to do, then. 

Reggie likes to think of himself as a testament to human endurance. He's had to watch the people he loves fall in love with everyone else but him all the while giving an Oscar-worthy performance of acceptance and chill in his permanent, perfect role of "the best friend".

The goofy but unlovable best friend. 

**Author's Note:**

> Come check me out on tumblr as [alexreggieluke](https://buckybear.co.vu/) and support me on different platforms 🤗


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